1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a laser processing apparatus which carries out a control to reduce the consumed power of a laser oscillator.
2. Description of the Related Art
In the past, there has been known a laser processing apparatus, which is set to a base discharge state with a low discharge voltage in a standard standby state before carrying out laser processing and which makes the base discharge stop and shifts to an energy saving mode when this base discharge state continues for a predetermined time so as to thereby keep down the consumption of energy in the standby period of a laser processing machine. This apparatus is, for example, described in Japanese Patent Unexamined Publication No. 2012-64636 (JP2012-064636A). In general, in this kind of laser processing apparatus, the operation to cancel the energy saving mode is started in a state where operations to select the pressure of the assist gas to be supplied to the laser processing head and select the processing conditions, etc. have been completed. Therefore, there are the problems that a relatively long time is taken until the operation for canceling the energy saving mode is started, the energy saving mode becomes long in duration, and the amount of energy consumption increases.
On the other hand, in a composite processing machine which successively carries out punching and laser processing, there is known an apparatus, which presets the time required for returning from the energy saving mode to the standard standby state (restore time), shifts to the energy saving mode at the time of punching, and starts the operation to cancel the energy saving mode at a time earlier than the starting time of the laser processing by exactly the restore time. This apparatus is, for example, described in Japanese Patent Unexamined Publication No. 2012-171084A (JP2012-171084A).
However, the time of start of laser processing is not necessarily a constant one. For example, if maintenance work or other non-routine work is carried out and the starting time of the laser processing is shifted, it is difficult to start the operation for ending the energy saving mode at a good timing.